She put the last dirty dish in the dishwasher and closed it slowly, lost in thought.  He'd eaten everything she'd fed him both for lunch and then again after he'd woken up around dusk.  Now he was showering if the evidence of her ears was accurate.  She leaned back against the counter, shoving her hair away from her face.  How could she be this in love with someone she knew nothing about, and didn't trust?  She had no idea.  Well, put like that, it was maybe a bit strong.  She trusted him in a lot of ways, but not in others. Not, for instance, when it came to his business dealings.  And not when it came to believing he would voluntarily tell her what was going on. 

She glanced in the direction of the bathroom, registering the sound of the shower stopping.  It served her right, she supposed.  She'd always known, from junior high school and her first crush on the school bad boy, what attracted her in men.  A certain kind of look for sure, and sense of humor, and intellect.  But more than that it was that rebel streak and Simon was full of it.  She'd always been so good and the hint of the law breaker just got her hot and focused her attention.  It affected her like the moon ruled the tide.  Which was fine, she told herself, when you're twelve and talking about skipping school or sneaking out of the gym during a school dance to neck behind the bleachers.  It's another when you're talking about someone who clearly has a more flexible relationship with the legal code than most.

She made a frustrated noise and turned to look out the window over the backyard, all shadows in the darkness.  Who was she kidding, she wondered.  She was stuck on him and getting loose...well, even thinking about trying made her stomach contract and her breathing constrict.  And when he touched her...oh man, just looked what happened with the notebook...she turned into a puddle.  Besides, she told herself, it wasn't like he was looking to be rescued, or to be reformed by the love of a good woman.

She snorted.  To hear Mama tell it, Daddy hadn't been either.  Nor was she sure, thinking about it now, that Mama had been all that focused on reforming him.  In fact, Mama had probably been too busy keeping her hands on him to worry about much else as far as he was concerned.  It had only been when she'd gotten pregnant with her and Betty that she'd made her wishes plain and Daddy, by then so stuck on her he couldn't think straight, had made her an offer she couldn't refuse.  Daddy was still the bad boy that Mama had gotten hooked on.  It was just that he'd redirected his bad boy propensities in other directions, like keeping Mama happy, teasing her mercilessly and making her life one surprise after another.

Bobbie frowned, tapping a nail on the counter.  An offer he couldn't refuse, sans being pregnant with twins or even pregnant at all...maybe there was something to that.  She didn't want him to stop being the rebel he was.  She liked that.  She just wanted him to stop doing it with things that got him shot or might put him in jail where she couldn't see him, or be with him and talk to him or touch him.  She wiped her hands on the dish towel and hung it on the refrigerator door handle, nodding to herself.  An offer he couldn't  refuse...yeah...that was the answer.  She smiled.  Oh yeah. 

She was still smiling when he came out of the bathroom, clean, dry and shaved.  Only by that time she was sitting on the bed, wearing fewer clothes and it was an entirely different sort of smile.

He looked down at her, a smile playing on his lips. He flexed his shoulder, the one whose skin was still light and new, and a bit puckered looking, where it had been torn and bleeding and infected. "It works," he said, as he approached the bed, and stood looking down at her. Something else obviously worked too.

"You're not allowed on top," she said.

"Oh? I don't remember that particular instruction from the healers."

She shrugged.  "They told me, not you."

"Did they now," he whispered as he put a knee down on the bed next to her and bent down to kiss her.

"Yeah," she said when he let her breathe again.  "Will that be a problem for you, do you think?"

He frowned in concentration as he thought about it. "I don't believe so.  Will it be for you?"

"I'm not sure," she said, eying him carefully.  "It might be that I'm feeling lazy.  After all this care and feeding I've been doing, you know?"

"I agree. If it had been me and some bloody delirious guy had shown up on my doorstep I'd have just let him lay there."

"And if it were you, what would you do?" she asked, leaning back, her weight on her palms.

"Kick him off to the side and step over him," he replied lightly. "He probably deserved it."

"Yeah but I'm not like that," she said.  "Too nice I guess."

"Yes, I've been meaning to mention that to you. You hang out with totally inappropriate fellas."

"Really?"  She tilted her head to the side, checking him out. "How do you figure?"

"You should find yourself a good man, who will treat you like you should be treated. He won't disappear or show up on your doorstep a mess."

Her eyes flashed.  "Don't even go there, Simon.  You're as bad as Ian is with Betty, deciding what I should and should do.  And what will or won't make me happy and what is or isn't good for me."

His lips twitched. "Well, if the shoe fits..."

"I'm not buying shoes," she said.

He sighed and moved to sit beside her. "What are you up to then? I'm not in the market for a good woman who'll save me."

"I'm not a good woman who wants to save you.  I'd drown trying.  I'm just a woman who wants to know what the man she loves is involved in that's getting him shot."

He gave it some thought for a moment. "My business model did not have a plan in place for instances where I fall in love with someone and consequently fail to deliver on the promised goods."

She met his eyes, her own huge.  "Oh you'll deliver on the goods alright, 'cause I'm gonna get mine, one way or another.  The question is how hard I'm gonna have to work to get it."

"Ah. That I don't know. Perhaps we can test your business plan."

She twisted towards him and toppled him back on the bed, landing on top of him.  "I just want you to promise me one thing.  I want you to swear it to me," she told him.

His dark eyes met her blue ones. "If I can."

She lowered her head down towards his slowly, the tip of her tongue making her lips gleam.  "You have to swear to tell me," she said and then paused, kissing him.  "You have to swear to tell me..."

"Tell you what," he asked, his hand reaching around to pull her down closer to him.

"The only thing I want to know," she whispered.

"What?"

"If it hurts," she said.

"I," he said between kisses, "solemnly swear," he reached for her butt. "that you will be the second to know if it hurts."

"Damn straight," she said.  "Now stop talking.  You need to save your strength for what's coming."

"Yes, ma'am."

Several hours later Simon moved enough to free his arm from under where Bobbie Jo lay curled up with him.  It was wrong. All wrong. He loved her. Never wanted to, never expected to, couldn't love her, dammit. His life was too complicated. There were too many things that could go wrong, and if he didn't keep his mind on all the parts of his life he was trying to juggle and keep separate it would all come crashing down on him.

He froze as she sighed in her sleep to snuggle down a bit more comfortably.  He waited until her breathing evened out again and her body went contentedly limp. The he got to his feet and winked out.

On her nightstand a note appeared shortly afterwards. 'See you at 8pm Saturday. Love, Simon.'

She slept late, the first good night's sleep she'd had in days, the first since he'd disappeared.  She stretched and rolled over, expecting to find him there and froze when she didn't.  She knew without looking through the rest of the apartment that he was gone.  She gave vent to a frustrated scream and hurled his pillow across the room.  She swung her legs off the bed and sat up, too furious to stay still and caught the flash of white against the alarm clock.   She read it and ground her teeth.  Not if she could help it, he wouldn't, she promised herself and crumpled the note, tossing it in the trash.

He cursed as the cup went flying and the hot coffee landed in his lap. He'd been cooling his heels on this bloody street, staring at a quiet neighborhood for hours now and nothing whatever was going on. He looked over at his partner, who found the spilled coffee amusing. "Just shut the fuck up," he hissed.

His partner started to laugh and then froze.  "There she is," he said.  "Looks like she isn't planning on sitting home on a Saturday night."

"The boss figured he'd show up here. Dammit. Now what?"

"She might be going to meet him.  Tell you what, I'll follow her and you stay here and dry off," he said.  And with that he strolled off after her, just another guy in Georgetown heading for the clubs. 

She took a right on Wisconsin and then, close to M Street, she crossed over and went into the American Cafe, where she greeted the host like they'd been friends since birth and was shown to a table in the bowed window where she could watch the street.  He crossed over after her and took a seat a the bar, angled so he could keep one eye on her and another on the bartender who was almost as beautiful as she was and wearing tighter clothes.  He ordered a beer and she ordered, he saw when it arrived, coffee and piece of apple pie.

Meanwhile the other one, having given up on trying to dry his pants with a small paper napkin, walked around a couple of parked cars and sank down to keep an eye on the house. What good it would do, he didn't have a clue. Baptiste would port in and probably right into the hallway of the brownstone. Still, orders were orders. You never knew.

His partner established that the bartender's name was Susie and she was a coed at Georgetown, getting ready to graduate at the end of the summer, while also observing half the men walking by the place slow and stare at the woman he was following.  She seemed oblivious, turning the pie into applesauce and letting the coffee go cold.  A couple of the servers stopped by as did the manager on duty.  She smiled and chatted and when they left went back to watching the street and her watch.

The guy waiting by the DuBois brownstone was astonished when he saw his quarry, Simon Baptista come sauntering out of the front door of the brownstone. He was dressed in a tux and stood on the front stoop, his hands on his hips, looking up and down the street. He shook his head, muttered what was probably a curse and ported out.

"Yeah, so much for that," the man watching from behind the car said to himself.

She sat in the window for over an hour and then pulling some money from her pocket, she stood, dropped a ten on the table and then left.  She hesitated outside and then turned to the left, heading down to M street and across it, following Wisconsin down to the canal where she found a bench and sat down, staring at the water.  He stayed in the shadows, watching her, debating an approach, wondering if snatching her would work.  He'd about made up his mind when she stood up again and turned back the way she'd come, leaving the bench to the couple approaching on toe path.

He swore to himself and followed her back to the brownstone.  She went inside and he found his partner, equally disgruntled and still looking like he'd pissed himself. "He was here but ported out. Dammit. You should have grabbed her."

He settled back against the car and shook his head.  "Naw, we don't want to grab her," he said.  And then he explained what he thought they should do instead.